The return of the Samurai Beancakes
When I saw the cover of the latest issue of Wired, with the tagline “Manga Conquers America,” my first thought was, great, yet another tired retelling of the growth of manga in America. Fortunately, the actual article, by veteran journalist Daniel Pink, tells a very different story, about the growing market for underground fanfic manga mashups, and how Japanese publishers are willing to turn a blind eye to the amateur editions as long as they help mainstream titles—and don’t get too successful on their own.
The accompanying manga-style comic, however, does tell the full history of the business, from its humble origins in the 1940s through today’s global industry. And it reminded me of something—something familiar. Sure enough, a trip down to the basement confirmed that I wasn’t afflicted with a false memory. I managed to dig up a copy of the February 1991 issue of Business Tokyo, a magazine that included a story I wrote on the growth of the manga business, which was accompanied by, you guessed it, a manga-style comic telling the history of the business. No, I don’t think Wired got the idea from me. For one thing, Business Tokyo wasn’t exactly a mainstream publication. For another, Wired’s comic is much better. Still, it was fun to reread my old article, and I’ve gone ahead and scanned it for anyone else who might like to take a look. As I recall, I had to convince my editors that a story on manga was worth doing; at the time, it wasn’t considered a serious business subject. Of course, times have changed, and I somehow suspect that Pink had no such trouble with his editors at Wired.
(And, yes, the title of the article, “Middle Aged Psychic Samurai Beancakes” is a homage to “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.” And, yes, I know TMNT wasn’t directly inspired by manga. But it clearly owed a debt to Japanese pop culture—or at least to that culture as filtered through American versions like Frank Miller’s “Ronin.” So, I felt the title was fitting at the time—and still do today.)
Click on thumbnail at the left to view full-size scans on Flickr.
